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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23187064">Bite The Hand</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anti_kate/pseuds/Anti_kate'>Anti_kate</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman &amp; Terry Pratchett</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Accidental biting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blow Jobs, Fuck Or Die, M/M, Porn Without Plot, Snake Crowley (Good Omens), Snake venom aphrodisiac, Venom WTIYS, angsty sex, dubcon, fucking while pining</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 05:41:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,942</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23187064</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anti_kate/pseuds/Anti_kate</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It had been someone in hell’s idea of a joke, he suspected, down in the corporation department. Give the tempting snake demon aphrodisiac venom. And yes, he’d used it a few times, back when he’d been new to the world and what he could do in it. But it had been about as subtle as threatening to bash someone over the head with a brick if they didn’t sin, and frankly he thought it was unfair. So he’d just... not bitten anyone. Until now. When he’d accidentally bitten his best friend, and injected him full of venom. Lust venom.</i>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>826</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Good Omens (Complete works), The Snake Pit</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Bite The Hand</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">

        <li>
          Translation into 中文-普通话 國語 available: 
            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23927335">授权翻译 | 噬子之手 Bite The Hand</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/InfntyOnHgh/pseuds/InfntyOnHgh">InfntyOnHgh</a>
        </li>


    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>So this is exactly what it sounds like.<br/>Thanks so much to Squiddz for the beta and the hand-holding (The Anxious Imposter Syndrome Writers Club is the best club). Please go read all the other snake venom fics in The Snake Pit for more cake!<br/>CW for ... dubcon.<br/>Also please note Crowley is only a snake at the beginning of this fic, which is why I haven’t tagged it for actual snake sex content, in case you’re either into that or not.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It happened sometimes when he slept. He’d wake up, and find himself in a familiar but different body, coiled up around the base of a potplant in a shaft of sunlight. His eyes didn’t open so much as remember to see. Altered muscles would ripple along his flexible spine and he’d taste the air with a flicker of tongue.</p><p>Sometimes it was even pleasant. Things seemed simpler. Time had a different quality–slower, thicker. An endless summer afternoon, one of those golden ones that seems to last for a short eternity, languid and perfect. And then he’d turn back into something human shaped, and it would all crowd back into him, all the memories and doubts and fears.</p><p>After they’d swapped bodies and survived their executions, they had gone for lunch at the Ritz, and the high of it had carried him for hours. But then he’d looked at Aziraphale’s face as he smiled fondly at him over dessert, and he’d felt a desperate exhaustion.</p><p>“My dear,” Aziraphale had finally said. “You’ve gone awfully quiet.”</p><p>“Just... tired.” </p><p>He shouldn’t feel tired, he should be jubilant. They’d survived, they’d helped save the world, they were free. </p><p>Aziraphale had reached out, cautiously, and put his hand on Crowley’s shoulder. </p><p>They’d held hands on the bus, the night before, and now this. It was nothing at all, and also too much, almost. An electric current that arced through Crowley’s being on every plane, touched all his raw nerve endings, made them sing with every hidden impulse he’d ever had. </p><p>“Why don’t you go home and have a sleep?” Aziraphale had said. There was something brittle in his tone, but he’d also smiled, in that determined way he had. There was no arguing with that. </p><p>Crowley hadn’t wanted to let him out of his sight. But he’d been so tired.</p><p>So he’d gone home, and fallen asleep instantly on his black sheets, without even bothering to undress. </p><p>And he must have slipped from one shape into another, and sleep-slithered in amongst his plants in the warmest room in the flat.</p><p>He must have slept like that until he was jolted awake by a touch, by a hand on his long back. Some primal part of his brain reacted with panic, and he thrashed, and bit. </p><p>His fangs had sunk an inch deep into Aziraphale’s arm by the time he realised what was happening, and there was a terrible blurred moment of horror as he pulled them out and yanked his head away. He transformed back into his human form, staggering as he remembered he had legs and how to use them. </p><p>Aziraphale clutched his arm to his chest. His face was grey, and his mouth a surprised circle. “You bit me!”</p><p>“Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to go poking sleeping snakes? You’ve been on earth for 6000 years, you should have had that one figured out millennia ago!” Crowley yelled, hot with shame and anger. If he’d still had fangs, they’d have been dripping. “At the latest!”</p><p>Aziraphale looked hurt at that, in more ways than one. “I wasn’t poking you, I just touched you! You hadn’t returned my calls for two weeks and I was worried about you.”</p><p>Whatever Crowley had been about to say then fled his mind. </p><p>“Let me see that,” he said, gruffly. Aziraphale made a noise that suggested he was still extremely upset by the whole situation, but he held out the arm, and Crowley took it, gently, and pushed up the sleeve. </p><p>The puncture marks were neat, round, and there was only a tiny stain of blood from each one. Instead, the skin around the bite was dark, almost oily looking, a stain that was already spreading down into the blue veins on the inside of Aziraphale’s arm. </p><p>“Shit,” Crowley said, as his brain finally caught up.</p><p>It had been a long time since he’d bitten anyone. Thousands of years. He’d almost forgotten, really, what it did. </p><p>It had been someone in hell’s idea of a joke, he suspected, down in the corporation department. Give the tempting snake demon aphrodisiac venom. And yes, he’d used it a few times, back when he’d been new to the world and what he could do in it. But it had been about as subtle as threatening to bash someone over the head with a brick if they didn’t sin, and frankly he thought it was unfair. So he’d just... not bitten anyone. </p><p>Until now. When he’d accidentally bitten his best friend, and injected him full of venom. Lust venom.</p><p>“Oh,” Aziraphale said, looking at the mark and the spreading darkness. “That’s rather horrible isn’t it? I’ll just get rid of it...”</p><p>He snapped his fingers but the bite was still there, and the darkness spread a little further. </p><p>“Crowley, why didn’t that work?” There was a faint hint of panic now in Aziraphale’s voice. </p><p>“Probably something to do with, you know, the general demonic... ness... of the venom,” Crowley said, trying not to let his own fear show. </p><p>“Can you...”</p><p>Crowley tried his own miracle and of course, that didn’t work either. He’d never tried to use his powers on Aziraphale’s corporation, and had, before now, vaguely wondered what would happen if he’d try. Now he knew. Made sense, he thought distantly, that he couldn’t just miracle the opposition so easily.</p><p>“Guess not,” he said, with a lightness he didn’t feel.</p><p>“Is it deadly? I’m rather afraid if I discorporate now they’re not going to hand me a new body.”</p><p>Crowley swallowed. “I don’t... I mean, I don’t know? The thing is... well.”</p><p>Aziraphale made a small but horrified noise. “Should you, perhaps, suck out the venom?”</p><p>“That’s not how they treat snake bites anymore,” Crowley muttered. He was still holding Aziraphale’s arm, and the skin around the bite-mark felt too warm. He resisted the urge to stroke the angel’s wrist soothingly. He’d already done enough harm, and there’d be no soothing Aziraphale soon. “Listen. You should... go and lie down, and I’ll make a phone call. See what we can do.”</p><p>He steered Aziraphale towards his bedroom, and as soon as the angel was sitting on the bed–rumpled and unmade, from where Crowley had fallen asleep weeks earlier–he shut the door. Then, before he could feel guilty, he snapped his fingers once more.</p><p>“Crowley!” Aziraphale’s alarmed voice carried easily through the door. “Why is there a ring of hellfire around the bed!”</p><p>Crowley let his head fall against the dark wood. “I’m really sorry, angel,” he said. “Can you trust me, please?”</p><p>There was silence for a long moment. “Of course I do, darling,” Aziraphale said, and he couldn’t have hurt Crowley more if he’d struck him physically. </p><p>Fuck. This was a disaster.</p><p>Crowley pulled his phone out of his pocket and called up a number he hadn’t dialled for a while. It took a while to go through, with buzzes and clicks and then unearthly shrieks, and then it was answered. </p><p>“Ordog here. Department of Corporations. What do you want?”</p><p>“Ordog. It’s Crowley.”</p><p>“Well, fancy hearing from you–“ the voice on the other end sounded as if it belonged to a creature who’d been smoking for millennia, thick and raspy. </p><p>“I don’t have time to chat. I need your help. I need information.”</p><p>“You’re a traitor, Crowley. You’re demona-non-grata around here,” the demon said with a low laugh. </p><p>Crowley pinched his nose. “I’ll send you a whole case of that butterscotch schnapps you like so much, ok?”</p><p>“Oh, well then. What do you require?”</p><p>“My snake form. Its venom. I need the file.”</p><p>There was silence for a moment and he heard the faint clacking of a keyboard. </p><p>“Yep, here we go, serpent form belonging to the Demon Crawly.”</p><p>Crowley spluttered. “They still haven’t changed my name? It’s been two thousand years!”</p><p>Ordog chuckled. “I don’t know what you expect from hell, Crowley.”</p><p>“Fine, fine. My venom–”</p><p>“Oh, sex venom! Very fancy!”</p><p>“Ordog. Please. Does it say how long the effect lasts?” It had been so long since he’d bitten anyone the details were fuzzy, and when he had used it, he’d preferred to bugger off rather than hang around for the messy part. </p><p>Ordog sucked air through their teeth. “Until the victim has sex, or dies. That usually takes about eight hours.”</p><p>Crowley went very still. “What?”</p><p>“Oh didn’t you know that? It doesn’t wear off. It’s fuck or die, sweetheart.”</p><p>Crowley sat down, heavily, on the red and gilt chair. “What about... wanking?”</p><p>“Nah,” Ordog laughed again. “Got to be, you know, a double act.”</p><p>“Right. And was it ever... tested on anyone not human?”</p><p>“Some demon studies. Same deal.” Ordog paused, then continued, in a sly voice. “Don’t tell me you’ve bitten someone non-human? A certain angel, perhaps? We heard all about you two lovebirds down here.”</p><p>Crowley wasn’t sure if he was going to scream or vomit. Or possibly both. </p><p>“The schnapps is on its way,” he said, and hung up. </p><p>Then he walked back to stand in front of the shut bedroom door. </p><p>The room beyond was quiet. It had been, by his reckoning, about fifteen minutes since he’d bitten the angel. It was almost certainly throughout his system now, and he should be feeling it. </p><p>He gathered his courage up. “Aziraphale?”</p><p>“Ah. Crowley. I’m feeling... a little odd.”</p><p>“I’m sorry.” Crowley put his hands palm-down the door. “I... I’m so sorry.”</p><p>“Oh no my dear, I’m the one who should be sorry for disturbing your sleep. I quite deserved it.” Even through the door, Crowley could hear he was trying to sound calm. “If you’d be so kind as to get rid of the hellfire...” and then Aziraphale’s voice changed, dropping in tone, a rougher note than Crowley had ever heard. “You could come in here and I could make it up to you. I’d like to make it up to you very, very much.”</p><p>Crowley’s skin felt too tight, as if he was still a snake and needed to crawl away and shed it, and shed all the dark secrets and awfulness of himself with it. </p><p>“Crowley,” Aziraphale said at once, rushed, horrified. “I didn’t–I don’t know why I said that. What’s going on?”</p><p>“It’s the venom. My venom. It’s an aphrodisiac,” Crowley said. “It was me. I did this to you.” </p><p>Silence. </p><p>“That rather explains it then,” Aziraphale finally replied, with a dry laugh. “I do feel rather odd. And will it... will it wear off?”</p><p>“In a way. I s’pose.”</p><p>“Crowley. What do you mean?”</p><p>“The venom... the thing is. The thing is, if you don’t have sex with someone, the venom kills you.” </p><p>Another long stretch of nothing.</p><p>“Angel?” Crowley asked wretchedly when it became too much to bear. </p><p>“Ah yes. Right. That’s rather a lot to take in. I suppose... onanism doesn’t count?”</p><p>Crowley almost laughed at that, even through the ache in the place where his heart should be. “No. Sorry.”</p><p>He heard a faint noise that he couldn’t identify through the door. </p><p>“I suppose you better come in here and fuck me then,” Aziraphale said in that same low, urgent voice as before, and then made a horrified sound. “My dear, that’s... I’m quite sorry about that. It’s getting harder... I’m having the urge to say all sorts of things. And do things. I feel as if I may be losing control.”</p><p>Crowley clenched his fists, hard enough to dig the nails into his palms. He couldn’t pretend that voice didn’t send hot waves of <em> wanting </em> through him. The thought of Aziraphale saying those words. To him. But not like this. Not… coerced. </p><p>“Is there someone I can call? A ... friend? Someone you... you know, have a relationship with?” He dragged the words out, remembering the club, the men he’d seen flirt with Aziraphale through the millennia, the way Aziraphale had beamed at them with delight. Maybe there was someone hanging around, some soft lovestruck poet with floppy hair.</p><p>“Don’t be ridiculous, Crowley!” Aziraphale sounded more himself, aggrieved. “You know what it’s like with the other angels. Unless you’re suggesting... A human?”</p><p>“I don’t know! You seemed fond of that Oscar bloke.” </p><p>“We are going to discuss this another time, Crowley. But no. There’s no-one. No-one but you.”</p><p>Crowley felt both sick and hungry. He was a starving man confronted with a tainted meal, and he’d stirred the poison in himself. </p><p>“Crowley,” Aziraphale said again, cajoling now. “Open the door, love. Please.”</p><p>“Don’t call me that,” Crowley muttered, too softly for Aziraphale to hear.</p><p>“I can smell you on the sheets,” Aziraphale continued. “I want to know if you taste as good as you smell.”</p><p>Crowley took a deep breath. “I’ll be right back.” </p><p>He bolted to the kitchen. Booze. He needed booze. He pulled out a bottle of some over-proof rum and swigged it back, until he’d probably swallowed a fifth of the bottle. The burn of it felt good, just what he deserved. </p><p>His options were all bad. He could ignore what was happening to Aziraphale and hope when he was discorporated he’d get a body back, and that heaven wouldn’t take the opportunity to enact some sort of revenge. Or he could open the door and let the hellfire flicker out and then... and then, after that, Aziraphale would probably never speak to him again. </p><p>But at least he’d be safe. </p><p>He’d have ruined it all anyway, he told himself. This was just a lot sooner than he’d been expecting. Might have had decades of nice lunches and boozy evenings in the shop, walks in the park, hand holding sometimes. Might have had all the time in the world. Until the sun exploded in five billion years, or until the heat death of the universe.</p><p>But no, he’d had to have a bloody nap, and then he’d literally bitten the hand that had saved him. </p><p>He took another swig of the rum. Then he walked back to the door of his bedroom, and opened it before he could stop himself.</p><p>Aziraphale was sitting on the end of the bed, staring down at his own feet, his hands clenched in the beige fabric of his trousers. Around him the hellfire circle flickered and leapt, the hungry tongues of flame contained only by Crowley’s power. His head lifted as Crowley stepped into the room.</p><p>His eyes were dark, the oily colour of the spreading darkness on his arm, and he looked at Crowley hungrily. “There you are.”</p><p>Crowley’s mouth went dry. “Just. Want to tell you how... sorry I am about all this. Ok? Ok.”</p><p>Aziraphale tilted his head slightly. “Are you? Perhaps this wasn’t an accident. Perhaps you wanted to bite me. Do you want to bite me again?” </p><p>Crowley’s cock, already half hard–<em> you sick fuck, </em>he thought, savage with self-loathing–filled against the too-tight denim of his jeans. He wanted to step forward and take Aziraphale’s face in his hands and kiss him. And he wanted to bolt from the room, slam the door behind him, get into the Bentley and drive. Drive himself into the sea, maybe, quench the simmering volcano within him in the darkness below the waves. </p><p>“Get rid of the hellfire, darling,” Aziraphale said, barely above a whisper, rising to standing. “Let me touch you. I need you. I’m burning for you.”</p><p>Crowley shuddered at that, and a current of horror ran through the thick hot shame of his own wanting.</p><p>“Don’t say that, angel,” he said. “You don’t know what it means.”</p><p>Aziraphale’s eyes were midnight shadows, black holes, and Crowley was falling into them. “I want to kiss you,” he said, and Crowley gave up whatever he was trying to do by hesitating. <em> Pretend to be reluctant, pretend you haven’t wanted this forever, plausible deniability. </em></p><p>He snapped his fingers. The hellfire fell away.</p><p>He wasn’t sure then which of them moved but one moment he was standing there and the next he was wrapped in Aziraphale’s arms, and pulled into a kiss. It was too hard and their teeth banged together; Aziraphale’s grip on him far too tight, his bones almost creaking under the pressure.</p><p>He’d thought about this so often, and it had never been <em> like this </em>in his imagination. He’d always pictured it soft and gentle, romantic even. No matter how much he’d despised himself for wanting Aziraphale in the first place, or for longing for some gauzy human nonsense, he’d always imagined it as being sweet and gentle, some stupid white-sheeted fantasy, whispered love confessions and tangled fingers. </p><p>There was nothing sweet about this. Aziraphale’s mouth was fierce and hot. One of his hands was in Crowley’s hair and his fingers curled and tugged even as he pulled Crowley as close as he could to deepen the kiss. </p><p>He kissed Crowley desperately, as if he’d been waiting thousands of years for the press of their mouths together. Thousands of years to lick into Crowley’s mouth and moan. </p><p>
  <em> Except that’s you, just you, this isn’t him any more than it was the day you wore his body into heaven. </em>
</p><p>They must have been moving because Crowley’s back hit the wall and Aziraphale crowded him up against it without breaking their kiss. He could feel Aziraphale’s cock pressed against his hip even through layers of clothes. The solid heavy warmth of him along the length of Crowley’s whole body, soft against sharp. The scrape of nails against Crowley’s scalp, the sudden bloom of sensation as Aziraphale bit down on his bottom lip. </p><p>He gasped at that and Aziraphale pulled back. This close Crowley could see his eyes were black with the venom, the veins on his neck were pitch dark too, as if his blood had thickened into tar.</p><p><em> My fault, </em>Crowley thought, dismayed, even as he was so incredibly, unbelievably aroused. Sick with guilt and desire. </p><p>“Crowley,” Aziraphale said, in that low hazy voice that made Crowley’s knees feel like they were about to give out. “I need you. Please. I just–” he swallowed, and for a moment the haze lifted, and there was anxious Aziraphale looking at him. “Say it’s all right?”</p><p>“Yes. Angel. Whatever you need,” Crowley said. He didn’t say, <em> this is my fault, if you asked me to crawl over broken glass to fix this, I would. </em> And he didn’t, wouldn’t, couldn’t ever say the other things that were coiling deep in him, the sick, hollow, demonic things. <em> Do what you want with me. Use me. Break me. Tear me open. Make me pay for what I did to you.     </em></p><p>Aziraphale shuddered, and then he was kissing Crowley again, tongue sweeping insistently against his lips and then into his mouth. He dropped his hands from Crowley’s hair to his hips and he felt the angel’s fingers fumbling on his belt buckle and then on the zip of his jeans and then on his cock.</p><p>“That’s it, that’s what I wanted,” he said against Crowley’s jaw.</p><p>Crowley thrust into his hand even as it was closing around him, a none-too-gentle grip. Aziraphale’s other hand moved again, and then his own erection was pressed against Crowley’s, both in that blunt-fingered hand. </p><p>“Fuck,” Crowley hissed, already hurtling towards coming with each stroke, with the friction of his body rubbing against the velvet hardness of Aziraphale’s cock and the firm grip of his fingers.</p><p>He was right on the edge, too close, but Aziraphale pulled his hand away. Then the angel sank to his knees.</p><p>“What are you doing?” Crowley hissed, disgusted with himself all over again, because it was completely bloody obvious what Aziraphale was about to do, and he should tell him to get up, to get on with it, get this over and done with, not to kneel in front of him like this. </p><p>“I told you I wanted to taste you,” Aziraphale said, breath hot on Crowley’s skin. He had no idea what to say to that, and it didn’t matter anyway because he had no words left when Aziraphale slid his tongue down the length of him, and then licked over the head of his cock, tongue wet and hot and perfect. Then he took Crowley into his mouth as if he was eating bloody ice cream in the park, and Crowley shut his eyes rather than stare down at that pale head moving up and down. He didn’t know what to do with his hands, wanted to shove them into Aziraphale’s snow and parchment hair, but instead he clenched his fists by his sides. </p><p>This shouldn’t be happening, not like this.</p><p>He made a terrible, wretched sound and couldn’t stop himself from moving, jerking his hips as Aziraphale sucked, and whatever control he had was gone, and he came with a muffled curse, one hand thrown up over his face. </p><p>Aziraphale pulled away but stayed on his knees and planted more frantic kisses against Crowley’s hips and then his stomach, pushing up his shirt, one hand running up to slide across Crowley’s chest. “You’re the most beautiful thing in the world,” he said, and Crowley only didn’t laugh with bitterness because he was still heaving for breath. “You were made for me. You know you were. You’re mine, Crowley, aren’t you?”</p><p>Crowley wanted to say, <em> fuck off, </em> but also, <em> say it again.</em> Instead he said yes, or something like it. </p><p>Aziraphale stood then, and kissed him again, his mouth still bitter with Crowley’s spend, until he was dizzy and half-hard again. Then the angel leaned back and snapped his fingers, leaving Crowley half-naked against the wall. </p><p>“Let me have you,” Aziraphale groaned, low and ragged, against his neck. </p><p>“Yes, fuck, yes,” Crowley hissed. </p><p>Aziraphale lifted him up, easily, as if he weighed nothing. He wrapped his legs around the angel’s waist, and he felt Aziraphale’s cock, hard and blunt, sliding against him, miracled slick.</p><p>A moment passed and then Aziraphale pushed inside him far more slowly than he was expecting. Not nearly as hard and frantic as he should have been, given what this was. </p><p>A fuck against a wall, was what this was, and when it was over... </p><p>Aziraphale’s whole body shuddered again, and his head fell onto Crowley’s shoulder. He was trying, Crowley realised then, to be gentle. To control himself. </p><p>“Angel,” Crowley whispered into his ear. “It’s all right.”</p><p>Aziraphale made a deep, desperate sound.</p><p>Then he moved, slow at first, then faster, and harder. And harder still, until Crowley’s back and neck were slammed into the wall with each plunge into him. </p><p><em> This this this, </em> he thought, distantly. He heard his own voice gasping from far away. <em> This. </em>Nothing else existed for a hot moment except the feel of Aziraphale moving, rough and fast and deep inside him, Aziraphale’s hands wrapped under his arse, Aziraphale’s fingers digging into his flesh, Aziraphale’s breath against his neck, Aziraphale’s teeth scraping against the skin above his collarbone.</p><p>“Crowley,” he gasped, a rough breath drawn in, sounding almost like something else. “You feel so good. I never knew–”</p><p>And then he came with a fierce growl and one last, slamming thrust. It tipped Crowley into another orgasm, untouched, an almost blinding rush that went on and on, burning away everything else but the two of them, wrapped together. </p><p>It was as if Crowley had been shaken apart, and then he slowly came back together, still in Aziraphale’s arms, his back against the wall and his head tipped back.</p><p>The world was still there. The room was very quiet, the distant sound of London traffic a dull hum far away, nothing else but the sound Aziraphale’s breathing and the pounding of his own blood in his ears.</p><p>Aziraphale pulled away from him slowly, their bodies disentangling, and lowered him to standing, before stepping back. Crowley’s legs barely felt functional, and he was glad he was backed up against the wall.</p><p>Aziraphale was flushed and pink, but his eyes were clear, a dark oceanic blue in the grey-walled bedroom, instead of that unnatural blackness. He was still completely dressed, and Crowley almost laughed. His bow tie was ever so slightly askew, and he resisted the urge to straighten it. Instead, Crowley reached for his arm, and saw the dark mark had disappeared, the puncture wounds almost invisible now, just two small pale ovals. </p><p>It was over.</p><p>“Do you feel better?” he said. What a stupid thing to say. But he couldn’t take it back, couldn’t take any of it back. </p><p>Aziraphale’s head jerked up from where he was still staring at his own arm. His expression was almost puzzled. “Yes,” he said, his voice almost back to normal again. Just quiet, too quiet. “Much improved, thank you.”</p><p>Crowley winced at the thank you. “Yeah well,” he muttered, and let go of the angel’s arm. He really didn’t want to be half-naked, Aziraphale’s come smearing down his thighs, for what was about to happen. He miracled them both clean and himself back into his jeans. He also snapped up a pair of sunglasses, and slipped them onto his face.</p><p>“Right,” he said then, and he sounded ridiculous to his own ears, voice too tight, too affectedly casual. “Drink then? Or if you need to go I can... drive you home. Or call you an Uber? Unless you want to walk. Get some fresh air.”</p><p>“No thank you,” Aziraphale said, frowning even more. “Would you like me to leave?”</p><p>“Course not. Unless. That’s what you want.” </p><p>“I don’t...” Aziraphale’s voice trailed off, and he looked around the room as if seeing it for the first time. The leaden grey walls, the dark blinds that covered the window, the slept-in bed.</p><p>The silence was too much, and <em> the feeling </em> Crowley had was more like panic now. “Angel,” he said, desperately. “I’ll do anything you want. If you want me to take you home, or not... or to leave you alone for a week or a month or a century or however long... I can do that. Or forever. I can leave you alone forever. Anything.”</p><p>Crowley would have gone on, would have kept talking, talked forever, never shut up, just to keep Aziraphale there, in front of him, even with his face settling into something hard and angry.</p><p>“Leave me alone?” Aziraphale repeated, puzzlement turning into incredulity. “Leave me alone? <em> Forever?” </em></p><p>“I can, I can do that. Yeah, sure. Forever. Easy. Big world out there, bet we won’t run into each other if we try–”</p><p>“Stop it,” Aziraphale snapped, and Crowley, somebody help him, managed to swallow down everything else that was trying to come out. “Stop it. I’m sorry this whole thing was so distasteful to you, but you don’t have to be cruel! I was coming here today to try to talk to you, to tell you how much I love you, and to apologise for everything–“ Aziraphale was almost shouting, the redness across his face from anger now. </p><p>“What?” Crowley said, struggling to make sense of what Aziraphale was saying.</p><p>“And you bit me! And then... you had to force yourself to touch me and of course that’s fine if you have no interest in physical relations, and I would never ever want you to do something you were unhappy with, but after all this time to suggest that we should <em> abandon </em> each other because of one moment–“</p><p>“You... love me,” Crowley echoed, his brain finally catching up.</p><p>He felt something inside him shift, some hard knot of fear and hope and joy and longing loosen. Unravel a little. Something he’d lived with for so long he’d thought it was a cosmological constant. Like his sharktooth bones or his red hair or his slit-pupiled eyes or the stars or gravity or the speed of light. </p><p>Unending. The way he loved Aziraphale.</p><p>Aziraphale stopped, and sucked in a sharp breath. “Of course I do.”</p><p>“And,” Crowley said, speaking slowly, trying to arrange his thoughts. “You think I don’t want you?”</p><p>“Don’t you? After all this time? After I pushed you away? After I told you it was over? After I said no, when you asked me to run away with you? After I… used you?” Aziraphale halfway extended a hand towards him, his expression half hopeful and half agonised. </p><p>“And … you’re not… angry,” Crowley said, looking down at his extended hand. “About the biting. And the venom.”</p><p>“No,” Aziraphale said, with a quick, pained smile. “It wasn’t quite what I had in mind for our first time together. But I’ve wanted you for ever so long. And I would vastly prefer it, of course… if you wanted me back. But I understand if you don’t.”</p><p>Crowley thought of the bandstand, and how they’d fought, and the things they’d both said, and then he thought of the burning bookshop, and the pillar of hellfire in heaven. </p><p>And then he thought about what it meant to have Aziraphale safe and sitting in that now unburnt bookshop, poring over some dusty old book. And what it meant that he’d come here, and that he’d said those ridiculous human things. About love, and wanting. So hopeful, despite everything. </p><p>“Don’t be ridiculous. Always going to want you,” he said, stiffly, the words catching in his throat, but he managed to reach out and take Aziraphale’s hand. “Always going to love you. Just how it is.”</p><p>Aziraphale smiled, and the sun came out, and he pulled Crowley in and kissed him again. </p><p>This time it wasn’t hard or desperate, just a gentle kiss on the mouth, sweet and soft, the way Crowley had always imagined they might kiss. Just Aziraphale’s mouth on his, and their hands tangled together, and the future opening up before them. </p>
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